Stockpiles

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MGyver
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Stockpiles

#1 Post by MGyver »

Edit by Geoff: This thread was split from this thread

Okay how about this: In practice, the physical stockpiles are kept on the individual planets on which the excess is created. Trading resources between planets could be done through instantaneous 'ethereal' central distribution, where there is no actual location. The letters below represent planets, the numbers represent mineral stockpiles

A-20---------------B-5-----------------C-5-----------------D-10-------------------E-0

With the system above, all planets are occupied and linked through the ethereal system. Every planet has instant access to 40 mineral resources. A blockade between B & C limits minerals on A to 25, and on E to 15. Capturing A means that the attacker gains 20 minerals (minus what is destroyed in the attack). Of course, how do you display this info in the GUI and keep it simple?

Another way to go about it is to have on-planet stockpiles with distance-limited trading. For the example below, assume that planets A to C as well as E are occupied, and D has a trade outpost. B through E are each one turn apart, B to A will take two turns to travel.

A-20------------------------------------B-5-----------------C-5-----------------D-0-------------------E-10

By default, the planets keep their stockpiles locally. The ethereal trading system still is in effect, but with a speed limit. Why can I send minerals across the known galaxy in one turn but it takes my fleet 5 turns? Example 1, I decide that I want to build a big monolith on planet C for 40 minerals. If I give the build order on C, it queues up with a note in red letters, "5/40", meaning that only 5 resources are currently available on planet C. Since my transport techs are poor, my network range is only 1 but my long-range transports can travel 2. I load up a transport with 20 minerals at planet A; 20 minerals are deducted from the network. I finish my turn. Things look like this at the start of the next turn:

A-0--------------(20)--------------------B-0-----------------C-10-----------------D-10-------------------E-0

C now has 10 resources, though some has already been used in building that monolith. Construction is underway, but a strategic blockade between A and B could hold things back; blockades do not apply within the short-range distribution network, but they can intercept long-range transport ships. Next turn:

A-0-------------------------------------B-20-----------------C-20-----------------D-0-------------------E-0

Transports have arrived at B, its cargo is re-added to the network's mineral reserves. Next turn:

A-0-------------------------------------B-0-----------------C-40-----------------D-0-------------------E-0

C has received all of the resources that it needs. This scenario could also apply to a situation where the player wanted to consolidate their stockpile on the central planet to keep it safe from raids. Planets who need resources for food or construction will automatically take it from the nearest planet(s) in range on the network. New graphic, network range is represented by "------":


A-40----------------/=============/-------------------B-10-----C-0----------------D-0-----E-20

C needs 40 resources for the monolith, E is building a scout ship for 10

C requests 40 resources from the network.
B is closest in proximity and has 10 stockpiled resources. They are sent to C (10/40 sent).
D is next in line but has nothing to send (10/40).
E is next but only has 10 unallocated, which it sends (20/40).
A is the most distant (out-of-network), and sends the last 20 resources by long-range transport(40/40)
40/40 sent, and the request ends.

There could be planetary management controls that prevent planets from sending resources (so that E has enough to build a second scout ship) and controls that prevent planets from drawing from the supply network (so that C builds the monolith on its own time without disturbing the stockpiles in the network). A mouse-over on a starline in the GUI could show what resources will be moving in what direction on the network.

Planet A might have to (automatically?) construct a transport ship before it can send its resources.

Tech tree advances could offer larger network ranges and capacities, faster network transport, faster long-range transport, % chance to sneak by blockades, etc etc.


I like brainstorming. If there's any particular section of the game that needs some thought, point me in the right direction!

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eleazar
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Re: Newbie: First Play (v0.3.15) and First Thoughts

#2 Post by eleazar »

PL_Andrev wrote:Blockade and resource network is not good idea. Its too complicated. As second side if your planet is locked by enemies you cannot build many ships fast or is impossible to send a fleet to protect your world. It is the same result as lack of minerals or broken 'resources network'.
The resource network system did end up being more complicated than i would like, due to unforeseen complications.
But the idea that you can blockade a planet to starve it for resources is an intentional feature-- something to add big-picture strategy to how you expand and where you post your ships.
PL_Andrev wrote:For races who attacks rich empires (high number of minerals collected by mines or trade) these 'collected' minerals are more interesting than other goods.

I thought about proportional values of planet's mineral production or planetary population to empire's total, but these values can be changed by ground combat or destroying planetary infrastructure/population from orbit...
That's not a bad idea. I'd put in in the "might be nice to have, but isn't critical" category.

I'm confused about why you mention planetary population in this context. When you take a planet you get all the surviving population added to your empire.

MGyver wrote:Okay how about this: In practice, the physical stockpiles are kept on the individual planets on which the excess is created. Trading resources between planets could be done through instantaneous 'ethereal' central distribution, where there is no actual location. The letters below represent planets, the numbers represent mineral stockpiles

A-20---------------B-5-----------------C-5-----------------D-10-------------------E-0

With the system above, all planets are occupied and linked through the ethereal system. Every planet has instant access to 40 mineral resources. A blockade between B & C limits minerals on A to 25, and on E to 15. Capturing A means that the attacker gains 20 minerals (minus what is destroyed in the attack). Of course, how do you display this info in the GUI and keep it simple?
That's the main reason we didn't go with that system.

The same criticism to a greater degree applies to your more elaborate idea.
MGyver wrote:Another way to go about it is to have on-planet stockpiles with distance-limited trading....
By default, the planets keep their stockpiles locally. The ethereal trading system still is in effect, but with a speed limit. Why can I send minerals across the known galaxy in one turn but it takes my fleet 5 turns?
Because it is complicated and non-fun to try to figure out the optimal distribution of resources when distribution is not instant -- let alone to try to display the information to the player. Planets would have to send out resources based on guesses about what resources would be needed where in the future. This would not be fun for the player to directly control, and if it was handed over to an AI (as so much in in MoO3) resource availability would simply be a mystery, that sometimes messes up your empire.

Remember we're trying to make a game, not a simulation.

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Geoff the Medio
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Stockpiles

#3 Post by Geoff the Medio »

eleazar wrote:
MGyver wrote:By default, the planets keep their stockpiles locally. The ethereal trading system still is in effect, but with a speed limit.
Because it is complicated and non-fun to try to figure out the optimal distribution of resources when distribution is not instant -- let alone to try to display the information to the player.
I'm wondering if anyone has any comment on the possibility of removing the concept of stockpiles entirely. In this case, there would be no stored resources of any type, and available resources at a planet would be what it and planets connected to it can produce that turn.

This would simplify the UI and eliminate numerous details and complications with tracking of the gamestate. Presumably the strategic importance of blockades would remain.

Currently, we are only keeping a single stockpile location per empire, so in many cases, "wasted" resources would remain wasted. The only way to ensure players don't need to make sure no planet is wasting resources would be to have a stockpile on each planet, and even then there would be no-stockpilable industry being produced locally.

Are there any obvious / major problems that having no stockpiles at all would cause?

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Re: Newbie: First Play (v0.3.15) and First Thoughts

#4 Post by pd »

I'm regularly relying on building up food and minerals and then switching focus to something else to increase my production/research meter and by doing so slowly depleting what has been stored.

I'm doing this especially in early game because I find it hard to get food/minerals/production/research going at the same time.

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Re: Newbie: First Play (v0.3.15) and First Thoughts

#5 Post by eleazar »

Geoff the Medio wrote:I'm wondering if anyone has any comment on the possibility of removing the concept of stockpiles entirely. In this case, there would be no stored resources of any type, and available resources at a planet would be what it and planets connected to it can produce that turn.

This would simplify the UI and eliminate numerous details and complications with tracking of the gamestate. Presumably the strategic importance of blockades would remain.

Currently, we are only keeping a single stockpile location per empire, so in many cases, "wasted" resources would remain wasted. The only way to ensure players don't need to make sure no planet is wasting resources would be to have a stockpile on each planet, and even then there would be no-stockpilable industry being produced locally.

Are there any obvious / major problems that having no stockpiles at all would cause?
There are downsides, but the benefits might very well outweigh them. I think we should at the very least seriously consider this.

:arrow: Note: "Trade" since it is not subject to blockades, might very well be the exception and be stockpile-able. In fact, that might be a good thing to help define where "trade" fits into the game.

:arrow: The trickiest thing, i think is dealing with starvation. We don't want to make it too easy to accidentally kill a planet. I don't remember if this mechanic was implemented or just discussed, but requiring food to raise the "health" meter, and making a sufficiently low "health" meter start killing population might do the trick.

:arrow: I think we still need to figure out a good way to display mineral/production miss-match in any non-connected segment of the empire. However, the removal of stockpiles would make this easier to do.

:arrow: Without stockpiles trade treaties suddenly become simple and obvious. For example: "I will give you my excess food for your excess minerals." Trade treaties are generally the only way to avoid waste (aside from perfectly calibrating your economic machine). If we want to make it fancier, we could add an exchange ratio, i.e. 1 food for every 2 minerals. There's no accidental breaking of this kind of treaty, and the terms of simple.
pd wrote:I'm regularly relying on building up food and minerals and then switching focus to something else to increase my production/research meter and by doing so slowly depleting what has been stored.

I'm doing this especially in early game because I find it hard to get food/minerals/production/research going at the same time.
To address this problem, I think if we get rid of stockpiles, the need for more fine-grained focus settings increases.
In the early game a pure focus on minerals or production doesn't make sense. Perhaps those are things you can research to learn. But an "Industrial" focus -- equal emphasis on minerals AND production -- would be of use sooner.

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Re: Newbie: First Play (v0.3.15) and First Thoughts

#6 Post by Geoff the Medio »

eleazar wrote::arrow: Note: "Trade" since it is not subject to blockades, might very well be the exception and be stockpile-able. In fact, that might be a good thing to help define where "trade" fits into the game.
I think trade needs to have a use, rather than an accumulation mechanic, to distinguish it / give it a purpose in game... Having a use for trade is going to require the species / planet / alignments / etc. system and/or an espionage system working.
:arrow: The trickiest thing, i think is dealing with starvation. We don't want to make it too easy to accidentally kill a planet.
It wasn't clear, but by previous post was meant to indicate that this already is a problem, since we only have a stockpile at one system. Anywhere not connected to that stockpile has no way to accumulate a food buffer. So, switching to no (food) stockpiles doesn't really make this situation much worse...
pd wrote:I'm regularly relying on building up food and minerals and then switching focus to something else to increase my production/research meter and by doing so slowly depleting what has been stored.

I'm doing this especially in early game because I find it hard to get food/minerals/production/research going at the same time.
To address this problem, I think if we get rid of stockpiles, the need for more fine-grained focus settings increases.
This issue is (probably?) partly the result of the particular content that's in the game, and not necessarily unavoidable due to game mechanics.

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Re: Newbie: First Play (v0.3.15) and First Thoughts

#7 Post by jlv61560 »

Hi. I look like I'm new here, but I've been lurking on this site for quite some time, and finally decided on this topic to register and weigh in. I've designed several 4X type space games as "board games" and this topic is one that created a lot of heartburn for everyone involved.

Honestly, getting rid of the stockpiles just makes sense. The problem with stockpiles is that unless they are restricted to the planet that produces them (only) you are faced with the need for distributing them. The problem with that is that there is no simple, intuitive way to handle that and the result is that players are forced into intensive micromanagement of a "merchant shipping chain" of some kind. While that adds opportunities for things like commerce raiding, blockades and piracy, the work-load quickly reaches the level of "burden" and makes the entire effort "un-fun." Personally, the whole stockpile thing seems to me to be reaching the point where it becomes something managed by the computer for you and thus reaches that MoO3 "mystery" stage. And yet, managing it yourself becomes a positive chore.

If we assume that merchant activity will occur regardless of what the player (the ruler of the entire empire) does, then you can easily develop systems that can replicate the blockade/commerce raiding/piracy effects without all the complexity. In effect, you might be able to assign warships to B/CR/P in a particular REGION of the map and then simply reduce planetary output for any hostile worlds affected by the warships. If you want to stop the B/CR/P, you simply send warships out to attack the warships conducting the B/CR/P mission.

One topic of discussion in the boardgame world is that if merchant activity occurs within your empire regardless of what you do, how does it benefit your empire? One possible solution is to simply give the player a bonus point or two of taxes/production points as a function of taxation of normal economic activity (increasing as production and the number of planets rises). The other is to simply ignore it and state that normal activity is just that, and is already "taken into account" in the basic production totals. Personally, I opt for solution number 2. Why complicate things unnecessarily?

If you still want to develop "reserves," you could simplify the entire process a la MoO wherein you had a "reserve" that accumulated production points or megacredits or whatever the title of their unit of production was, which you could then expend elsewhere by simply pointing and clicking. Admittedly it is somewhat abstract (given the argument about shipping resources around the empire faster than the fleet can move), but if we assume this is mostly a cash/knowledge-based investment stockpile that allows greater production of indigenous resources on the planet being invested in (and assuming that we have FTL communications) then it becomes easier to suspend disbelief. And, as the philosophy statement says, we're more interested in effect than we are in physics anyway.

So even if intra-empire commerce and what not is factored into the actual production numbers, that still raises the issue of inter-empire commerce, and, again, you could do worse than the method used in the original MoO. Simply agreeing to trade X number of megacredits with the resulting profit or loss being extracted from your general cash reserve. While the MoO method was a tad linear, it would be easy enough to factor in the occasional random event (economic boom or bust) as a modifier on income, together with the truly brilliant MoO method of requiring some up-front investment in terms of money and time before the trade route really pays off. This doesn't require weird construction of a single freighter (which then somehow morphs into dozens of tiny freighters) or any other overly "gamey" feature.

If you want to require an investment in trade (and assuming you don't want to make the players manage fleets of freighters and passenger liners and the like), you can either require "research" into trade or create an entirely different analogous system that requires players to invest in trade and which then produces extra resources over time. Trade would then become something the players could manage in the same way they do research.

Just some thoughts from someone who's been down this path a couple of times and hasn't really reached any clear solutions....

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Re: Newbie: First Play (v0.3.15) and First Thoughts

#8 Post by eleazar »

Geoff: perhaps the abolition of stockpiles should be separated out into it's own thread?


jlv61560: welcome :)
A board game perspective is probably valuable for this project. Without a compute to crunch numbers, rules need to be paired down to the minimum.
jlv61560 wrote: Admittedly it is somewhat abstract (given the argument about shipping resources around the empire faster than the fleet can move), but if we assume this is mostly a cash/knowledge-based investment stockpile that allows greater production of indigenous resources on the planet being invested in (and assuming that we have FTL communications) then it becomes easier to suspend disbelief. And, as the philosophy statement says, we're more interested in effect than we are in physics anyway.
You don't have to apologize for something being abstract. Some posters consider "realism" to one degree or another important, but it is not a characteristic of ideas that actually get into the game.

FTL (instant) communications can be assumed since any ideas that involve non-instant communication simply tend to greatly increase complexity.

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Re: Stockpiles

#9 Post by eleazar »

Geoff the Medio wrote:I think trade needs to have a use, rather than an accumulation mechanic, to distinguish it / give it a purpose in game... Having a use for trade is going to require the species / planet / alignments / etc. system and/or an espionage system working.
I don't disagree. Perhaps all that needs to be said now is that the main problems with stockpiling don't apply to trade if it remains an unblockadable resource. Weather stockpiling is a good thing can only be determined as trade is further developed.


Am i right in the previous post about how starvation works? I.e. Lack of food wears down the health meter until population loss starts?

Geoff the Medio wrote:
eleazar wrote: ... if we get rid of stockpiles, the need for more fine-grained focus settings increases.
This issue is (probably?) partly the result of the particular content that's in the game, and not necessarily unavoidable due to game mechanics.
I'd rather have fewer focus options, but on reflection managing resource production when you only have one or two significant planets seems like the most significant problem with switching to stockpile-lessness.

How could content change to adress this?


Sorry for the double post these forums aren't quite working right on my mobile device.

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Re: Stockpiles

#10 Post by Geoff the Medio »

eleazar wrote:Am i right in the previous post about how starvation works? I.e. Lack of food wears down the health meter until population loss starts?
Having planets lose health when starved is how it should / will eventually work, but I don't think it's how it actually works in the latest SVN.
...managing resource production when you only have one or two significant planets seems like the most significant problem with switching to stockpile-lessness.

How could content change to adress this?
IMO, the real problem is the perceived need to switch between food or minerals or industry to grow and produce stuff in the short term. This is possible and beneficial (and thus necessary) due to stockpiles. Without them, the player will be (even more) forced to pick one focus and stick with it, as there's no way to build up a stockpile of something to tide you over while switching to something else and thus achieve an effective "balanced" focus when averaged over time.

To address the direct question, starting meter bonuses could also be set up so the homeworld can feed itself and one or two other planets, and always has decent output of industry, even without being on an industry-related focus. Then, the player can choose to focus on minerals to get lots of industry, or research to do research. Or, we can require the homeworld to focus on food to feed any other planets, so the player must choose between growth, research or production in the short term.

Also, the general size of meter bonuses compared to baseline / always active meter values at the start of the game could be rebalanced. Right now, one of the species in the game gets +15 or +45 food depending what focus is chosen. That's a ginormous difference. If it was +20 or +25, the perceived benefit of switching to farming, then to minerals, then to industry to spend the accumulated minerals, etc. would be much less. The player might be more inclined to pick one option and stick with it, since swapping focus repeatedly doesn't make so much of a difference (at first), and there's at least some output and ability to do stuff in game even when not focused.
Sorry for the double post these forums aren't quite working right on my mobile device.
Multiple posting is fine within reason, and sometimes is useful, such as when a new thought needs to be added after a delay, so that new attention can be brought that would otherwise miss the new text.

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Re: Stockpiles

#11 Post by eleazar »

Geoff the Medio wrote:To address the direct question, starting meter bonuses could also be set up so the homeworld can feed itself and one or two other planets, and always has decent output of industry, even without being on an industry-related focus. Then, the player can choose to focus on minerals to get lots of industry, or research to do research. Or, we can require the homeworld to focus on food to feed any other planets, so the player must choose between growth, research or production in the short term.
Hmm, that sounds like the right direction.

Perhaps under normal early-game conditions:
* A homeworld set to "food" could feed itself and several other semi-developed planets, while still producing non-negligable production and research.
* A homeworld set to something else could still feed itself, with a little margin to spare, while making significant progress in the chosen focus. This works fine with trade and research, but it still seems awkward to focus on minerals or industry when you only have one really productive planet. Most of the theoretical increase from the focus would be wasted.

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Re: Stockpiles

#12 Post by Geoff the Medio »

eleazar wrote:
Geoff the Medio wrote:...always has decent output of industry, even without being on an industry-related focus.
...seems awkward to focus on minerals or industry when you only have one really productive planet. Most of the theoretical increase from the focus would be wasted.
That's why I suggested making the homeworld have good output of industry even when not focused on it; the player can focus on minerals, and use them with the free industry to produce stuff.

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Re: Stockpiles

#13 Post by MGyver »

May I suggest that excess production on a planet may be used by any other planet in its star system? Ultimately, the resources of the entire system are pooled and instantaneously traded. Thus your homeworld can focus on food while other recently settled planets in its system get their infrastructure up to speed. Again, resource focus can still be planet-based, but it affects the output of the system rather than a single planet. This could allow productive research outcomes such as asteroid mining to integrate a little more easily into gameplay.

This way of doing things may simplify operations later on in the game, where the player could quickly peek at the output of each system instead of searching through the list of planets to see where they should construct their mega-projects.

And I agree: the +15 to +45 scale used for food focus is extreme to say the least! What if I only need 17 food per turn?

How about a focus system where 'points' may be allocated to each type of resource? On my planet that needs 17 food, I may only put one point into food and the remaining points into minerals. The number of points available could be determined by planet characteristics and techs. This may be a workable compromise to the slider bars I suggested earlier.

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Re: Stockpiles

#14 Post by eleazar »

MGyver wrote:May I suggest that excess production on a planet may be used by any other planet in its star system? Ultimately, the resources of the entire system are pooled and instantaneously traded.
Yeah that's how it works, unless possibly when the system is controlled by an enemy fleet. Similarly resources are instantly traded with any other systems that are "connected".
MGyver wrote:How about a focus system where 'points' may be allocated to each type of resource? On my planet that needs 17 food, I may only put one point into food and the remaining points into minerals. The number of points available could be determined by planet characteristics and techs. This may be a workable compromise to the slider bars I suggested earlier.
Allocating points is effectively the same as sliders. It is fiddly. FreeOrion currently can have up to 5000 planets (last time i checked), so with empires of hundreds (or maybe thousands) of planets we really need a system that doesn't require frequent, slight manipulations for optimal output.
The main aim behind the focus system that you can't micromanage, that doesn't accept slight tweaks.

jlv61560 wrote:If you want to require an investment in trade (and assuming you don't want to make the players manage fleets of freighters and passenger liners and the like), you can either require "research" into trade or create an entirely different analogous system that requires players to invest in trade and which then produces extra resources over time. Trade would then become something the players could manage in the same way they do research.
Fleets of freighters are definitely out.
Techs that allow trade-enhancing buildings can be (or will be) researchable. These buildings will often only work, or work best for planets that are set to a trade focus.

But "trade" is purposely still somewhat undefined, pending the development of later parts of the game.

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Re: Stockpiles

#15 Post by MGyver »

I like the idea of building effects being modulated by resource focus!

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